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E39 (1997 - 2003) The BMW 5-Series (E39 chassis) was introduced in the United States as a 1997 model year car and lasted until the 2004 when the E60 chassis was released. The United States saw several variations including the 525i, 528i, 530i and 540i. -- View the E39 Wiki

I have a 2003 touring and only about 43K miles on it. The lift gate/tail gate struts won't hold the door open any more. I realize there is a lot of labor to replace the relatively cheap parts. Have many of you had this happen and if so, replaced it yourself or had a shop do it, and what was the cost?

Hello, I have a 2003 525iT as well, mine has 80K miles. Your timing is perfect 2 weeks ago I had my local dealer in North Carolina (no indy mechanic wanted to do the job). Performance BMW in Chapel Hill, NC agreed to do it for only the book time labor of 2 hours even if the job took longer, which they said it generally does. They kept their word. Their labor rate is a steep $120 an hour !. So I got it done for $240 plus tax, plus the part (gas strut) that was another $60. Perhaps you can use this to persuade your local dealer to do the same.

Apparently the job takes a tool that is very hard to find and very expensive. Details on that:

After asking my dealer if CPO would cover it (car is under CPO until next Feb), they said it would not. I let the issue go for a while but finally contacted BMWNA who, on my behalf, talked to the dealer and now they are covering the entire repair as a goodwill. Since the car has barely more than 40K miles and has been garaged and the hatch hardly used, it seemed to me something that they should cover, and they have made good on that, so I salute BMWNA for the help and of course my dealer for working with them. I have always gotten fantastic service there (Leith BMW in Raleigh, NC).

Now the hatch willl stop smacking us in the head when we are loading the cargo bay, which will come in handy when our first baby is born in February 2009!

Redshift,
You can't keep that baby in the cargo bay! It's against the law. Well, maybe not in NC. Kidding. Congrats on baby and on free stuff. Wish I could trade wagons with you.

Well, I try not to...I do drive it the most out of all of my cars, but with the M5, 330Cic, and M3 and also my new BMW motorcycle begging for attention, it's really hard to drive them all much. It doesn't help that me and my wife both work at home now.

Nice bike. I just sold my '01 R1200C with the arrival of baby #2. Will get another in a few years. If you ever decide to sell your wagon, please let me know. I like!

With what I paid for the wagon, and the fact that I'm still paying the loan off, I doubt it would ever make sense to sell her Plus all the mods I have done - M5 front brakes, M5 mirrors, M5 wheels all around, full Dinan stage 3 suspension, Magnaflow exhaust, Conforti CAI, Dinan stage 2 software, ICE angel eye rings, blacked out front grilles, removed T-bar on front grille, stainless brake lines all around. I bet she wouldn't be worth even $20K at this point and she only has 43K miles and is still under CPO

Damn. I haven't really had anything fail on my E39, and that is (hood struts) is NOT something that I have even considered.

I suppose that there is not any way to prevent this failure. How would you service the struts without simply replacing them?

.

No, we're talking about the tail gate struts. The hood struts are 5 minute replacements and easy to do at home. The tail gate struts on a wagon are hidden beneath the headliner and require hours of work to get to the part, then a special tool to use to replace the struts themselves, then more hours to put it all back together. Huge pain in the bum.

Thanks, good to see the part photo. Is that price for one or two? Or does it take just one? What's the typical life of one of these? 43K seems a bit low, especially when I use the glass hatch itself without opening the main door probably 80% of the time.

Feedback: My strut is failing too. 99 540it, 79k miles. Now that is colder in the evenings (<50 degrees), the tailgate tends to drop on its own. When it's warmer, (>70 degrees) it does manage to stay open.

Got the car back Tuesday. Wow, what a difference. I didn't quite realize just how dead those struts were until I got the car back. Now, when I lift the tailgate to somewhere just below horizontal, it simply lifts itself up (smoothly) to full open and stays there. It's a joyous thing!

Putting baby gear in the back will be much easier now for my wife if she happens to be out alone with the baby.

Special kudos to Leith BMW and BMWNA for taking care of this as a goodwill deal for me.